International conference on security: Shoigu called the main global threat

International conference on security: Shoigu called the main global threat

26.04.2017

On Wednesday in Moscow in the beginning of the VI Moscow conference on international security MCIS-2017, organized by the Ministry of defence of the Russian Federation, which brought together 708 participants from 83 countries. According to defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, the conference has become “an annual forum that brings together representatives of the defense ministries, international organizations and non-governmental experts in search of answers to key questions of global security.” The conference was attended by the correspondent of “MK”.

photo: Gennady Cherkasov

The meeting was opened by the Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolai Patrushev, who read out a message from the President of Russia. In this message, Vladimir Putin noted that the forum “has firmly established itself as a popular platform for professional discussions on a wide range of global and regional security, the search for optimal ways of their solution. ...In the heart of your agenda is the fight against international terrorism, which has reached an unprecedented scale and, in fact, defied civilization.”

Nikolay Patrushev also noted that in the current environment especially dangerous is the course of individual States to take unilateral action and intervention in the internal Affairs of other countries. According to him, it leads to the occurrence of wars and international conflicts, but also to the rise of terrorism is the main security threats nowadays. More detail on the threats in his statement delivered by the Minister of defence Sergei Shoigu, paying particular attention to such global security challenges as “the development of missile defense systems and prompt global strike using high-precision non-nuclear weapons of long range, comparable in effect to nuclear weapons”. In addition, the global number one threat in the modern world, according to Shoigu, is terrorism. He condemned “flirting” with terrorists and their support in any form, stating that the elimination of terrorists is one of the priorities of the Ministry of defense of Russia, an example being the operation of our videoconferencing in Syria. The Minister said that the result of this operation, terrorist organisations such as Islamic state and “Dzhebhat EN-Nusra” (an organization banned in Russia), was dealt a “powerful blow”, and created the conditions to start the process of political settlement in the country. In this context, he positively assessed the cooperation with the USA on the Syrian issue, while noting that the cooperation between Russia and NATO has been frozen. And this was not the initiative of our country. “Against Russia is a tough and uncompromising information war”, — said Shoigu. He recalled that countries of the North Atlantic Alliance began to deploy military infrastructure on Russia’s borders, and implement strategic threat diagrams. A threat to the security of Russian servicemen have called the Minister Shoigu missile U.S. attack on Syria. He said that “such steps are forcing us to take additional measures to ensure the safety of personnel”.

The Minister of foreign Affairs of Russia Sergey Lavrov in his speech at the conference also talked about the problems of terrorism, emphasizing its international aspect. He paid particular attention to the need to “work on mistakes” and invalidate the actions and decisions which have pushed the middle East and North Africa “on an inclined plane the General degradation of the situation with a still uncertain outcome”. For this, according to Lavrov, it is necessary to recognize the cultural and civilizational diversity of the countries of the modern world and to refuse the imposition of values from outside.

Especially Minister Lavrov drew attention to the danger which manifested itself in recent times. According to him, a terrorists appeared technical documentation and production capacity to create chemical weapons which they have applied. In this regard, he recalled the initiative of Russian development in the framework of the Conference on disarmament, the International Convention for the suppression of acts of chemical terrorism and on the proposal to expand the possible scope of the Convention, including measures to counter biological terrorism threats.

The growth of the terrorist threat in his speech also spoke the chief of General staff army General Valery Gerasimov, noting that Russia has a lot of experience dealing with her. In the Military doctrine of the Russian Federation of 2014 increasing activity of global terrorism was first identified as a military threat. Russia is the country that is one of the first, since the 90-ies got the experience of warfare with terrorists on its territory. “The first attack of terrorism, we recaptured and have made some conclusions: first, to fight with terrorist groups, the armed forces must prepare well in advance; secondly, terrorism should be hit preemptively in the early stages of the formation of the threat not to allow his ideology to penetrate the minds of the population, to grow and to occupy new territory; thirdly, terrorism cannot be eliminated without the use of military force, but military force is also not his to win,” said the chief of staff.

As an example, Valery Gerasimov has called Syria “the development of events in Syria follow the Libyan scenario would lead to the fact that recently prosperous country would become a source of dissemination of terrorist threat for the entire region.” Russia’s intervention prevented such a development. The General noted that Russian troops are doing in Syria exclusively on anti-terrorism, being there legally.

The conference featured speeches and foreign guests. In particular, the Minister of defence of the people’s Republic of China Colonel-General Chang Wanchuan believes that combating terrorism requires comprehensive measures aimed at addressing not only the symptoms but also the causes of the problem – political, economic, cultural and diplomatic. The fight against terrorism, in his opinion, should receive the support of the people. The Chan Wenchuan highlighted the danger of the growth of nuclear terrorism. He also urged to abandon double standards in the fight against terrorism and not to divide terrorists into “good” and “bad”.

The Minister of defense and Armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran Brigadier General Hossein Farmers are the main culprits of international instability called “following the Zionist forces backed by the U.S., Israel and some Middle East countries led by Saudi Arabia, who are the creators and sponsors of terrorist groups”. Russia’s presence in Syria, the Minister called a “symbol of international cooperation in the fight against terrorism.”

See photo essay on the topic:

The fight against terrorism were discussed at the Moscow conference on international security

31 photos

The Minister of defence of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan Khawaja Muhammad Asif special attention to his words, drew on the socio-economic causes of terrorism. He said, “When people take away their dignity, self-respect and subject them to social and economic injustice leading to inequality, the exploited begin to blindly follow the merchants of death not only for the money, but in order to go against systems that are unable to respond to their problem.” He also stressed that today have become widespread in low-intensity conflicts between States and irregular armed groups. Thus, modern wars, there is no clear theater of operations and the front line — said the Minister. He said that Pakistan supports the efforts of the Quadripartite coordination group for Afghanistan and deeply concerned by the incitement to sedition and abetting terrorism on the part of various intelligence agencies.

This theme was continued by the former President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai, who began his speech with a story about the recent history of Afghanistan, strongly affected by external interference. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan began, support from outside Islamist currents and groups, which continued after the withdrawal of Soviet troops. As a result, in Afghanistan from around the world began to flock to the extremists. After 15 years of US military presence in Afghanistan, the crisis has not ended, but began to spread to neighboring countries. External involvement, according to Karzai, has led to the formation of the “Islamic state”. “Terrorism continues to be a product of policy, namely, the thoughtless following short-term and narrow national interests at the expense of others,” — said the politician.

VI Moscow conference on international security MCIS-2017 will continue its work on Thursday, when discussions will cover issues of combating terrorism and radical Islamism in the middle East, security of the information space, perspective ABOUT security in Central Asia.